Here’s what happens when a longtime iPhone user switches to Android

For Apple loyalists, the mere thought of dumping the iPhone and switching to Android is enough to send shivers down your spine. For Android fans, the idea of using an iPhone in the first place is an awful one. Enthusiasts on either side of the fence seem incapable of imagining life in the other group’s shoes, and online battles between Apple users and Android users erupt constantly. But do things really have to be this intense?

We have covered accounts in the past from people who have made the switch from one mobile platform to the other, and experiences have varied tremendously.

Westaway was nervous about making the jump from the iPhone to Android, especially considering how dramatic the switch is for many people.

“I thought I might despise Android,” he wrote. “An admittedly smaller part of me wondered if I’d actually love it. What I wasn’t prepared for was what actually happened.”

So, what actually happened when Westaway took the leap?

“Not much at all.”

The writer noted that there were some initial issues making the adjustment, and the first handset he tried — the Galaxy Note 3 — was far too big to be used comfortably. “But beyond the first 48 hours or so, any sense of strong emotion towards Android, either positive or negative, was notably absent,” he explained.

Westaway wrote that the main reason the switch was so surprisingly simple was that just about all of the apps and services he used on his iPhone were readily available on Android as well.

“The services I used the most were right there at my fingertips, in less than half an hour,” he wrote. “It’s true that there’s a difference in the apps available for iOS and Android, and that iOS still tends to get new apps first, but for me at least, there was nothing missing. I realised the apps I used the most were multi-platform, third-party and free to download.”

There are clear differences between the iOS-powered iPhone and Android devices, and Westaway noted a few of them in his piece. In the end, however, both platforms are comparable and more than capable of getting the job done, and one is not inherently better than the other.